


Where the Ice Grows

by Lady Divine (fhartz91)



Series: Deliver Me 'verse [19]
Category: Glee
Genre: Alternate Universe, Don't copy to another site, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Established Relationship, Future Fic, Light Angst, M/M, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-01
Updated: 2021-01-01
Packaged: 2021-03-10 19:13:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,860
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28482204
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fhartz91/pseuds/Lady%20Divine
Summary: Now that Kurt is free from his self-imposed prison, he wants to move on with his life, try to go back to the future he had dreamed of all throughout high school. But he's known only fear for so long, he doesn't know how to move forward.He doesn't know how to grow.
Relationships: Kurt Hummel/Sebastian Smythe
Series: Deliver Me 'verse [19]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/62214
Comments: 4
Kudos: 14





	Where the Ice Grows

**Author's Note:**

> So just to recap, in Special Delivery, we're seeing Kurt and Sebastian travel the country, retracing the footsteps of Sebastian's childhood, the trips his mother took him and his brother on, while Kurt tries to come to grips with the future. This is from their trip to Vail.

Kurt eyed the gray mare suspiciously, then his boyfriend, who stroked the horse's nose, murmuring soothing sentiments.

“You really expect me to get on this animal?” Kurt asked. And Sebastian chuckled, delighted at how perfect a snob his boyfriend sounded.

“Yup. The place we’re going is too far to walk, especially in the snow.”

Kurt climbed the pair of wooden steps a portly stablehand brought him, the cheerful man helping Kurt get his balance before instructing him how to mount the mare. “Is the goal of this trip to make me suffer?”

“Nope.” Sebastian watched Kurt hoist himself onto the horse’s back with the grace of a seasoned rider. He shot Kurt an accusatory look. “You say you’ve never ridden a horse before?”

“N-not once.” Kurt's voice shook, looking leery as the mare shuffled forward and back, getting used to the weight of her new rider. "But I've mounted other things ..." 

Kurt meant to follow up with a story about how a good friend from high school, Brittany, had taken him and Finn to motocross once. She'd said he was a natural after he climbed on his bike. That was, of course, before his epically embarrassing crash seconds later. But Kurt didn't, stuttering to a halt, his mouth hanging open as his comment registered. The stablehand sputtered, and Sebastian shook his head, grinning so hard, it looked painful.

"I'm not touching that one," Sebastian said, mounting his Arabian – a sleek black stallion that looked as if it had been born to run. And Sebastian definitely had the seat of a natural-born rider. _His parents probably made him take lessons when he was younger,_ Kurt thought. Wasn't that what the uber-wealthy did? Kurt wondered if there were horses on the Smythe estate. The subject didn't come up when he was there, but he wouldn't be surprised. 

Sebastian seemed so at ease on his stallion. Kurt didn't know for sure, but he didn't think his mare liked him too much, the way she snuffled when he tried to speak to her, tossed her head and shook her mane when he attempted to pet her. He was certain that she would have preferred Sebastian as a rider, what with the rapport they'd been building, and felt cheated getting stuck with Kurt.

Sebastian looked at his boyfriend, rigidly seated in his saddle, trying so hard for Sebastian’s sake. Kurt had been such a good sport during their trip, patiently following Sebastian on his every whim, to every bizarre, touristy, or even hidden locale Sebastian dragged him to.

Little did Kurt know (because Sebastian had yet to tell him) this ride through the hills on their rented horses was less about recapturing Sebastian’s childhood and more about Kurt.

About the spark that had started to extinguish in his eyes.

For weeks, Sebastian sat and watched Kurt in bed, at his desk, on the couch, with his sketch pad opened to an empty page, pencil pinched between his fingertips - sitting, staring, but not drawing. Kurt had wanted a stab at going back, retracing his steps, living the life he felt he was meant to have. But roadblocks had thrown themselves in his path. Unexpected ones. Obstacles of self-doubt.

It hurt Sebastian to watch the frustration, the pain, the disappointment on Kurt’s face every night as he packed up his sketch pad and surrendered to sleep.

“Remember to have them back here before the sun sets. That's in _two hours_ ,” the caretaker, Mabel - a husky woman dressed in denim overalls, a quilted coat, and thick, rubber boots - commanded. “Once the sun goes behind the mountains, the temperature will plummet.”

“That’s more time than we need,” Sebastian assured her. With a click of his tongue, Kurt and Sebastian left the stable, making their way up the hillside towards a spot Sebastian found years ago with his mom, and quite by accident. 

Kurt’s mare followed Sebastian’s stallion - a good thing since Kurt had no interest in controlling his horse whatsoever. Nor could he, his hands gripping the reins so tightly, they were digging through his gloves. He did his best to relax, watch the scenery pass, as the beast trodded along. 

He would love to come back during the summer. During this time of year, everything was basically white on white with more white. The snow and ice-covered landscape surrounding them was so overwhelmingly white, Kurt thought he might go blind. Everything looked identical covered in its blanket of snow. Depth perception didn’t exist here. A tree fifty yards away looked like it was growing right next to him. 

It was disorienting. 

Sebastian stopped his horse, waiting as Kurt caught up. He reached into his jacket pocket, pulled out a black glasses case, and handed it to Kurt.

“Here. These will help.”

"Thank you." Kurt popped the case open. The glasses were Gucci because of course they were. Kurt chuckled. He wasn't complaining about Sebastian's incredible wealth. Not by a long shot. But it struck him as funny considering the financial state Sebastian was in when the two of them met: his cruddy apartment with the broken heater and his shower that drooled water; his burner phone; how he rode the bus everywhere. Now he was pulling five-hundred-dollar sunglasses out of his pocket like they were Kleenex.

Kurt slid the frames onto his nose. He felt ridiculous wearing sunglasses while riding a horse like a way-too-chic-for-words drunk cowboy. But once he saw the world through the tinted lenses, he didn’t care how he looked. They lessened the glare, changed his aspect, and he could see correctly again. He could finally appreciate the snow-covered wilderness for its desolate beauty.

_Desolate._

That’s how everything looked.

Just like so many other places they had visited.

Kurt was beginning to sense a pattern.

Sebastian brought his horse to a stop beside a small cluster of trees, tying the reins to a sturdy branch before helping Kurt do the same. Sebastian took a moment to hold Kurt in his arms, missing the press of their bodies together during the long ride. He'd originally wanted them to ride double, but with the cold and the climb, he worried about the horse’s back. So he opted for singles instead. He had rented the mare for Kurt because the stablehand told him she was the calmest animal they had.

It also didn’t hurt that her name happened to be Elizabeth.

“Do you have some obsession with these desolate landscapes?” Kurt asked. “Because we seem to visit a lot of them.”

“Desolate?” Sebastian chuckled, his warm breath burning the frozen tips of Kurt’s ears. “Is that all you see?”

"Well ... kind of. Yeah," Kurt said guiltily, suddenly feeling like he was missing something obvious. But obvious to Sebastian didn't mean obvious to Kurt.

Sebastian took Kurt’s gloved hand and led him the rest of the way up the hillside, stopping at a ledge overlooking a large lake. They stopped as close to the edge as Sebastian dared go. He held Kurt in front of him, arms wrapped securely around Kurt’s waist. The land below them seemed to stretch out for miles, but the lake looked close enough to touch. Icicles covered everything. They decorated the branches of the trees, glittering in the afternoon sunlight.

The sun, too, seemed close enough for Kurt to reach up and grab in both hands, but he couldn’t feel its warmth on his face. It was a strange combination of intense beauty and intense sadness.

“Oh God,” Kurt breathed. “It’s beautiful! Like some fairy tale wonderland! But why are we here?”

Sebastian sighed. He could feel the sadness seeping out of Kurt, even as he gazed around him in awe. He had locked himself behind an iron gate for so long. Now that he had his freedom, he didn’t know how to handle it.

“You’re so frightened, gorgeous,” Sebastian said, mouth hovering close to Kurt’s ear. ”Of life. Of failing. You think you’re broken, that that's all you are. So you’re stuck in a place where you can’t look back, and you can’t move forward. That’s why you can’t create.”

Kurt froze. He didn't think Sebastian was paying that close attention.

He wondered how long ago he'd noticed.

“You’ve sort of become your own desolate landscape,” Sebastian continued. “So beautiful, so full of potential, but …”

“So, you’re trying to get me to see the beauty in desolate landscapes." Kurt sniffled. "But you pretty much proved my point.”

“What do you mean?”

“The Salton Sea, Death Valley, here … there’s tons of beauty, but nothing new grows. Animals survive in those places; they don’t _live._ Plants maintain, but nothing worthwhile blooms.”

“Are you sure about that? Or could it be that your scope of what type of growth is worthy of notice is a little narrow?”

Kurt turned his head to look at Sebastian, confusion clouding his eyes. “I don’t understand.”

“I think I’ll let our landscape here do the explaining for me.” 

"What on earth does ...?"

"Shhh." Sebastian raised a finger to his lips. “Listen …” 

The two men stood quietly, listening to the sounds of nature around them. But as far as Kurt could tell, there were none. The wind didn’t blow. No animals scurried among the bushes and trees, nor crunched in the snow. Not a single bird flew. The only sound Kurt could hear was a faint crackling and popping coming from the direction of the lake.

“I'm sorry. I don’t get it,” Kurt said finally.

“What do you hear?” Sebastian asked.

“I don’t know. I hear … uh … Rice Krispies Cereal?”

Sebastian kissed the back of Kurt’s head. “That’s it!” he said as if Kurt had just told him the secret of the universe.

Kurt shrugged. “I still …”

“Kurt, I tell you to look for growth, and you automatically think of trees, flowers, grass …”

Kurt nodded. "Duh."

“But there is none of that here. Not right now. It’s all hidden under the snow. But one thing here does grow, _is_ growing as we speak. And that’s the noise you heard.”

“Then do you mind cluing me in? Because I’m at a loss.”

“The ice.” Sebastian leaned a cheek against Kurt’s hair. Kurt shivered, moved back closer to him. “Up here where the snow covers everything, the ice is growing.”

"What?" Kurt gasped, peeking out over the ledge from the safety of Sebastian’s embrace. 

“Didn’t expect that, did you, gorgeous?”

Kurt shook his head, staring down at the ice-covered water, at a loss for words.

“You can still create, Kurt,” Sebastian whispered. “It’s in you. You just have to learn to do it in unexpected ways.”

Kurt thought about what Sebastian said as they rode the rest of the way down the hillside, straining to hear the snapping of the ice on the water over the crunching of snow beneath the horses’ hooves. He sat in quiet contemplation the whole way back to the hotel. That evening, after a long, hot shower and dinner in their room, Kurt took out his sketch pad and began to draw. Sebastian fell asleep that night to the sound of Kurt’s charcoal pencil scratching feverishly over the heavy paper, at peace, with a smile on his face.


End file.
